Deviations of satellite-measured sea surface salinity caused by environmental factors and their regional dependence

Abstract

Satellite measurements have largely improved sea surface salinity (SSS) observations in the recent decade, including Soil Moisture Ocean Salinity (SMOS), Aquarius/Satélite de Aplicaciones Científicas (SAC) D, and Soil Moisture Active-Passive (SMAP). This study evaluates the deviations between the satellite SSS products and the in-situ observations (ΔS) and analyses their relationships with the environmental factors, including sea surface temperature (SST), precipitation, and wind speed. The level 3 satellite SSS generally correlates well with Argo-observed SSS but differs in the middle and high latitudes and the tropical convergence zones. The smallest ΔS appears in the subtropical open oceans, where the sea surface features warm SST, rare precipitation, and low wind speed. The variations in mean |ΔS| for the three satellites show a robust dependence on SST, precipitation, and wind, with large ΔS (outside 5%–95% interval) in particular tending to occur in areas of cold SST, heavy rainfall, and high wind speeds. The most pronounced SSS deviations occur in the middle and high latitudes (beyond 40°) due to cold SST. In particular, heavy rainfall in the subpolar regions and strong westerly winds in the mid-latitudes also make the satellite SSS measurements less accurate. In the tropical convergence zones, large SSS deviations are mainly related to heavy rainfall, showing significant surface freshening. The fresh biases related to rainfall are more significant in Level 2 SSS than in Level 3, due to the short period of the convective rainfall. In addition, surface freshening is more obvious in low wind speed scenarios, showing that the fresh skin layer induced by rain is more common on the calm ocean surface.